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Dec 22 All your favorite holiday specials are anti-capitalist

A Christmas Carol

Scrooge is a capitalist. He is the type of person who would be called a "job creator" today. He makes a ton of money and he hoards it. He's basically a caricature of an Ayn Rand character (because Ayn Rand's characters totally aren't caricatures already), written 62 years before she was even born. He's so rapaciously capitalist that it was probably inevitable that Disney turned him into a hero.

After Scrooge has been haunted by the ghosts of Christmas Present, Past, and Future, what does he suddenly become concerned in? Higher workers wages. Healthcare for the families of his employees. Giving out free meals to the poor. In essence, Socialism*. God would bless us, every one, if God wasn't a creation of the bourgeoisie to keep the proletariat in check, Tiny Tim.

*You could, theoretically, make the argument that Scrooge is not so much a socialist as a sudden convert to trickle-down economics.

A Charlie Brown Christmas

This anarcho-Christian fable shows children acting like rapacious capitalists. Sally wants "tens and twenties" for Christmas. Lucy wants "real estate." As Charlie Brown and Linus leave the school play to shop for Christmas trees, everyone demands fake, gaudy aluminum trees. This line even gets busted out:

Linus, the story's left-wing hero, explains that "Christmas has not only gotten too commercial, it's gotten too dangerous." He then gives a speech about the true meaning of Christmas. This shouldn't be called A Charlie Brown Christmas. It should be called The Kingdom of God is Within You, Charlie Brown!

It's a Wonderful Life

I mean, the main villain is a capitalist banker who is trying to destroy the protagonist's dream of building a housing project. Next.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

We all know the Dr. Suess was a treehugging commie, right? The Lorax is an insidious attempt at subliminally turning all of our children into virulent anti-capitalists, and Yertle the Turtle was actually used as anti-fascist propaganda in the Second World War.

The Grinch has become the second most-cited Christmastime villain, along with that other great capitalist, Scrooge. The Grinch, a small-hearted furry who lives in a swanky mountain mansion above Whoville, despises their hand-holding, peacenik communitarianism, and looks to cure them of it by depriving them of material goods. But what the Grinch learns is that the heart of the revolution comes from its people, and that impoverishing them will only make them stronger. The revolution is coming. It cannot be stopped.

Home Alone & Home Alone 2

Far be it from me to suggest that these movies are one and the same in terms of structure or plot, but they both carry the same message: adults - i.e. "the man" or "the system" - are incompetent, dumb, or criminal, and children - i.e. anarchy and chaos - will inevitably win the day.

A Christmas Story

One of the most chilling anti-capitalist fables is A Christmas Story, a cautionary tale in which a middle class family's constant grasping for material things - leg lamps, Zeppelins, Red Rider BB Guns - is disrupted by their lower class neighbors starving dogs. The allegories in this movie just keep coming: Santa - the capitalist symbol of Christmas - is portrayed as demonic and uncaring. The Father futilely grasps at a higher standing in life, not recognizing that his status symbol, the leg lamp, is gaudy and obnoxious, and was doomed from the beginning. Ralphie is conned into believing that his mindless radio entertainment was ever anything more than just a cynical attempt to sell him Ovaltine. A grim reminder if there ever was one that underneath the shiny facade of capitalist society lies a dangerous, violent world of bullying, greed, and shattered dreams.

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

A more lighthearted communist tale, Rudolph admits that sure, materialism is nice, but it deftly points out that those outside or beneath the capitalist system are callously cast aside to the so-called "Island of Misfit Toys." Those misfits (shall we call them a "vanguard"?) then save the day when a climate related disaster of excessive fog causes the fragile, materialistic holiday to collapse. Is it a coincidence that Rudolph's nose is red? You be the judge.